In 2013, Neil Armstrong Academy opened in the West Valley City Highbury area. Unlike other K-6 schools, or any other school in West Valley at the time, for that matter, it was a STEM school. Neil Armstrong made city-wide headlines for being the first school in the valley to implement a STEM-focused curriculum designed to teach skills required for careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics at an early age. The overwhelming success of Neil Armstrong’s STEM curriculum prompted several other schools in West Valley to integrate STEM learning. 

The STEM initiative in West Valley City began with Dr. Tyler Howe, the first principal at Neil Armstrong Academy. Because of his incredible success at Armstrong, Howe received the Granite School District Principal of the Year award in 2015. He went on to become principal at West Lake STEM Junior High shortly after it adopted the STEM curriculum, and he later worked as principal at Granger High School. As of Feb. 4, Howe was appointed as Granite School District’s assistant superintendent. 

Dr. Howe didn’t always intend to be an educator. In fact, he originally wanted to pursue a career path in business. In college, he switched his major to Elementary Education when he realized he had a passion for working with students in a classroom environment. 

“It’s a privileged position,” Howe said in an interview with The City Journals. “There are very few other jobs in the world that can impact so many people’s lives for the better. It’s been a wonderful experience to get to work with kids for so many years.” 

Howe is a firm believer in the benefits and impact of hands-on learning, which drives his involvement with the push for STEM education. He recounted several STEM projects that he participated in alongside students at Neil Armstrong Academy, such as teaching ballistics and trajectory by building catapults, and the Bungee Barbie competition, in which students attempted to figure out how to drop a Barbie doll from the roof of the school without making a collision with the ground. 

“STEM is really the way a lot of us want to discover things,” Howe said. “It’s not always ‘does the teacher have the right answer?’ All of these fields are a lot more ‘I wonder if this could work, let’s try it. Now it did, or maybe it didn’t, so let’s try it another way.’ There’s a fun process in that.” 

In March 2020, tragedy struck as a category 7 earthquake hit the West Valley City area, causing the ceiling at West Lake STEM to collapse. Fortunately, no students were in the building when this occurred. However, the destruction meant that the school needed to be torn down and rebuilt from the ground up. The school was relocated to Westbrook Elementary, where Howe managed the changes and helped students and teachers adjust to an unusual scenario. 

Having worked as a principal at an elementary school, a middle school and a high school, Howe has had the opportunity to work with students of all grade levels. He recalled a Granger graduation ceremony in which he handed out diplomas to students whom he remembered working with as second graders. “Knowing what they were like in elementary school, then in junior high school, then seeing them walk that stage was one of my greatest accomplishments,” Howe said. 

In his new decision-making role with Granite School District’s executive leadership team as assistant superintendent, Howe can continue working to positively impact education in West Valley City and throughout the district. As of March, he is in the process of selecting and interviewing a new team to work with. 

When asked what advice he would give to anyone looking to pursue a path in education, his response was simple: “It’s worth it. Being an educator may be one of the hardest jobs in the entire world, but it is so worth it.” λ